Powerful Angles, In-Between Moments, And Intimacy: The Work Of Photographer Jen Carey

Carey’s work for The Wall Street Journal has been important in her developing her strong visual language. Working with numerous models to create a natural ease in her photographs, Carey’s subjects often display a quiet strength and an intimacy that radiates well beyond the frame. Her contemporary fashion photography has expanded to include collaborations with and commissions by high-profile publications and brands, including British Vogue, Le Monde, Louis Vuitton, and Burberry.

Carey’s work presents a shift away from the sea of photographers that define the industry: what makes her work interesting, besides her skilled compositional eye, is the way bodies pose in more haphazard and subtly atypical positions. The selection of images below feature a variety of different moments: some are directed and stylized, yet others are not necessarily what would be considered the traditional ‘final shot’: models carry their dry-cleaned garments, others appear to be waiting around in chairs. Yet for Carey, these in-between moments are pointedly part of her oeuvre. The focus on texture and materiality is equally as important as the picture-perfect portrait—instead of positioning the body at straight angles to champion the garments’ desirability, Carey turns her subjects into objects of art, in celebration of aesthetic difference.